The APCO currency factor

That’s how much it cost Malaysian taxpayers to send NTR into orbit .. err .. to visit Washington and have a chat with the U.S. President.

And, of course, his Mrs hadda tag along and organise a “Faces of 1Malaysia” showcase spread over two days for the natives of the U.S. of A to savor. Though strangely, from the various news reports covering this extravangaza, ostensibly to ‘mend fences’ with the most powerful nation in the world, the performers and content presentation were pre-dominantly malay-centric.

Whoa! Not only is NTR’s UMNO Baru brethren sabotaging his brainchild project, is his spouse doing the same thing?

Wokay, back to claptrap Nazri.

Didn’t he deny US$20 million (or thereabouts) was paid to APCO in the aftermath of the CSIS debacle in February 2010?

If it was not true then, why should we believe him now?

Excerpts:

On claims published by blogs in Malaysia alleging that the government paid US$20 million (RM67.3 million) to Washington lobbyists to clear its image following the trial involving Parti Keadilan Rakyat advisor Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, Nazri said the claims were baseless.

“Where does this US$20 million supposed to have come from? This is a wild allegation and accusation made by the opposition. There is no necessity to clean Malaysia’s image,” he said.

Is it sooo difficult to get an honest straight-forward answer from our ministers?

Therefore, if APCO is sooo good at what they do, how come there’s a story making the rounds in cyberspace that 1Malaysia is similar to 1Indonesia, including banners and all that jazz, which inexplicably also have APCO footprints in recent years.

NTR claims 1Malaysia is an original idea from his own home-grown Malaysian think-tank.

Sooo .. did his local advisors lazily re-hashed the program by using the 1Indonesia template with inputs from … (yeah, right) .. APCO reps who happened to be in town pitching their high-falooting credentials?

We therefore get to the point – apart from the currency in which APCO is paid, what about APCO’s currency to this nation in light of sooo many gaffes, denials and fumblings emanating with the BN government’s decision to utilise APCO’s so-called lobbying expertise?